"Even if people do wrong, we're social animals, so what can we do about stopping them doing the same things in future? Saying people are 'bad' or 'evil' is just an unwillingness to engage an unwillingness to try to empathise. That sanctimonious attitude doesn't help anyone."

"If you went for a job interview in a Glasgow law firm, they used to ask you what school you went to. And that was a way of finding out what religion you were."

"I always wanted to work at 'Take A Break' magazine, you know, just to inject a little bit of politics into their stories. I applied for a job there after I'd done my law degree and didn't even get an interview. I only wrote 'Garnethill' because I didn't get that job!"

"Comics don't work if the story is all in the text and the images are illustrative. It's hard to have enough faith in the artists to allow them to do their job."

"We used to wonder where war lived, what it was that made it so vile. And now we realize that we know where it lives... inside ourselves."

"True authority is measured not by subjugation, but by the empowerment of others. For where clarity resides, peace inevitably follows."

"The next war... may well bury Western civilization forever."

"All philosophical inquiry begins with the humility to admit the limits of knowing. For where clarity resides, peace inevitably follows — an essential principle for the reflective life."